Topic: The Seventh Game: Tech Brief

[Morgul]

Technology:

Propulsion:

Normal Space:

Most normal space travel is done with Ion Engines. The principle is pretty simple: Use magnets to throw hydrogen nuclei out at near light speeds. Basically, it's a really simple system, but it uses quite a bit of power. (No, they are in no way generators, unlike most scifi. Personally, I think having engines generate anything other than thrust is a stupid idea.)

Subspace:

Faster than light travel is, as we know, impossible. So, the trick isn't to travel faster than light. Instead, Ships move through 'subspace' which is a fancy name for moving in the fourth dimension. The basic principle can be explained this way:

Take a piece of paper, and draw a stick figure on it. Now, bend the paper into a U-shape. If the person were to move across the paper, it would take them a while to. However, if you pick them up, and move them in the third dimension, and it takes less time. Now, with subspace it's the same way, except that there's the combined effect of being able to 'crumble' space time (contract in front of you, and expand behind you) that give an effect of moving faster.

In Subspace, gravitational 'eddies' and mass 'shadows' exist. The forth dimension is the one where gravity 'lives' (as much as light 'lives' in a higher dimension), so changes in gravity cause vast sweeping changes in subspace, and vice versa. Orriginally, it was thought that subspace could be used as a weapon, one that could destroy planets, and end the war quickly, but the problem is that it's impossible to predict how changes in subspace will affect normal space, and it's even possible to create a gravitational wave that travels billions of lightyears, destroying everything in its path. (insert testing horror stories I haven't written here.)

Your 'speed' in subspace depends on you 'depth'. Basically, the farther removed from normal space you are (the deeper in subspace) the faster you travel. However, the deeper you are, the more the gravitational eddies take hold, and the more subspace tries to crush your ship.

Entering subspace involves the precise bending of gravity to create a wormhole of sorts to enter subspace. If your subspace field collapses while in subspace, you are violently thrown back into normal space. Also, it's possible to get stuck in 'limbo' (simultaneously entering and exiting subspace) which causes horrible gravitational shockwaves and turns your ship into a singularity. (a.k.a. a "black hole")

Metaphasic:

Metaphasic technology is, simply put, the best thing since sliced bread. It's also next to impossible, and no one even knows it exists, except the handful of researchers who created it. The theory is "simple": Use two subspace drives to allow a ship to remain in limbo, collect the tacheon particles that form up in between the subspace fields, and focus them to form a wormhole into 'hyperspace' or the 11th dimension if you prefer. You pop into hyperspace, and then exit into subspace again... but this time in a new place, instaneously.

The downside is that it takes great power, two complete subspace drives, and you need exit coordinates. What really sucks is that the only way to get those coordinates is to enter hyperspace, and take a look. (you can get your coordinates, and that of your surrounding area pretty easily, but you can't predict the hyperspace coordinates of the planet a few million kilometers from you. You need to go there and take another look. It has something to do with quantum mechanics.)

Right now, there is only a handful of ships whice can handle the stresses of metaphasic travel, and even fewer that have all the technology required to find coordinates. Basically, it's travel that exists in theory, and has worked a handful of times in practice by black projects conducted by the League.

[fehknt]

Are we going to have any "normal" engines for combat, or something?  Ion engines are pretty low on thrust, although are great for thrust per unit of energy thrown at them.  I'm just thinking manuvering thrusters (small bursts of plasma vented from the fusion reactor?) with a REALLY high impulse, but only limited use until you risk killing the reactor by forcing it to run too hot or something.

Also -- how small can subspace engines be made?  Specifically, would it be possible to create a missle that traveled at FTL speeds?

Can weapons be fired in subspace?  if maybe (i'm guessing it depends on how crazy you are feeling), then what are possible consequences of disabling the automatic AI restraints on such a thing and firing anyway?

Personally, I love the idea of the metaphasic tech.  I can imagine playing a character that runs a black-op metaphasic exploration ship, with the mission to find strategically important hyperspace co-ords.  dangerous, but fun -- you'd be popping around the entire galaxy, trying to find a better way from point A to B.  Does path taken matter in hyperspace?  that is: if i  leave A and get the co-ords for B, do i always have to travel A<->B or could I travel to another known point C from B although that specific path has not been taken before?

[Morgul]

Hmm... making me think here . (I love thinking)

Engines: The Ion engines can be made small enough, and powerful enough to serve as thrusters. subspace engines are used most often, with the ion thrusters being backup. The only difference between venting plasma, and the ion engines is that the ion engines shoot it out at much higher velocities...

Think about firing a plasma cannon. You don't want it to recoil when you fire.. (and in fact, it won't; there's not a good deal of mass in plasma, by itself since it's just a really hot gas) So, to sum up... yes, there are thrusters (high output high effiecency ion engines) and there may be other non ion/gravitic solutions as well.

Weapons: Yes, weapons can be fired in subspace. Plasma weapons are fine, projectiles... well, they don't have a subspace field, so they have a tendancy to drop out of subspace, exploding as they do, possibly causing subspace ripples, which make bad news. So, projectiles are considered 'extreme' in subspace. There are, however, subspace mines that pretty much disrupt a subspace field, and explode while still in subspace (hence keeping most of it from causing bad sideeffects for anyone but the ship fallign out of subspace.) Oh, and no, missles can't have subspace drives, but anything with a large enough power source can have a limited subspace drive. the endinges can be made rather small (large desktop computer sized)... but the reactors are generally much larger (large desk sized). Some companies (like Corona Noir Ki [CNK] ) are trying hard to fix this limitation.

Metaphasic: In hyperspace, coordinates are absolute, (and infinite) if not deterministic. Basically, what I mean by that is while I can't tell you where an object will be, it *does* have a position, and only one position (in hyperspace). There is however, and infinite number of possible positions for that (or any) object. Now, if you go A ==> B, and get the coordinates of B, you can then go to C, get it's coordinates, and go A ==> C, or B ==> C. Route doesn't matter. Only position, and destination.

It should be noted that hyperspace is curled into a very tiny ball. Because of that, the distance between any point, and any other point is so small, it approaches zero. So, even though there's an infinite number of possible points, there's almost no distance between any of them. (Yes, it's hard to imagine a ship almost 2 miles long entering a region of space that's smaller than the smallest part of an atom, but it *is* possible. The math is almost beyond me, and it involves waaaay to much quantum mechanics for me to follow... but it works. I've read enough books that explain the concepts I've just described.)

Plus, this is a game, and a sci-fi book. Trust the author, he's god, even if he's wrong.

--Chris

[fehknt]

just a follow-up question, then... are the coords in hyperspace basically like cartesian coords (1-1) or do they share more with polar coords (one point is given by an infinite number of coordinates) (just because I know the coordiantes to the enemy base, doesn't mean that someone else with a different set of coords that says it's also for the enemy base is necessairly lying.)

[Rosencrantz]

<snip>

It should be noted that hyperspace is curled into a very tiny ball. Because of that, the distance between any point, and any other point is so small, it approaches zero. So, even though there's an infinite number of possible points, there's almost no distance between any of them. (Yes, it's hard to imagine a ship almost 2 miles long entering a region of space that's smaller than the smallest part of an atom, but it *is* possible. The math is almost beyond me, and it involves waaaay to much quantum mechanics for me to follow... but it works. I've read enough books that explain the concepts I've just described.)

Plus, this is a game, and a sci-fi book. Trust the author, he's god, even if he's wrong.

--Chris

So, are you talking like on the order of the planck length, or more along the lines of for all points a and b in subspace, and for all epsilons(in the real numbers) greater than zero there exists a metric d [effectively distance b/w two points] such that d(a,b) < epsilon?

[Morgul]

Well, either way would work in terms of story, but I was orriginally thinking along the lines of plank length. (Think Kaluza-Klein/String Theory) However, the latter would work as well.... (And most people won't be able to follow it, so they won't question it.    8) )

--Chris